http://www.alliance-natural-he...n=content.eu.Default

The Codex Laws the EU is attempting to pass would change the trade agreements via the WTO, "harmoninizing" not just trade in general, but what can be sold as supplements under the new language, where vitamins and other supplements would be considered drugs. Codex would effectively by-pass current U.S. laws protecting consumer rights, since the U.S. would be punished for not conforming to the WTO's standards. All of this, of course, is the latest effort to save the pharmaceutical companies from their losses as effective self-care strategies cut into those huge profit margins.

Please familiarize yourselves with this push by the EU to take control of individual freedom, one of the most frightening examples of its attempt to socialize not only medicine but continually the behavior of its citizens; for that to be successful, and to retain its socialist paradigm without collapsing, it must make the rest of the world compliant as well.

http://www.alliance-natural-he...ent.campaign.default

Here is the organzed effort in Europe that has the best chance of changing the Codex languaging so that consumer rights are protected. If you want to keep purchasing vitamin C, Echinacea, Saw Palmetto, and various minerals here in the U.S. and Canada, not to mention hundreds of other supplements, then you need to take this threat seriously.

Great news . . . . the UK's attempt to get the EU's restriction on consumer freedom lifted re: availability of vitamins, minerals and herbs has its first success (Sorry for the long URL, Phil):

http://www.alliance-natural-he...m?action=news&ID=151
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"What does this mean? That the chances of consumers being able to continue using the natural food supplements they believe are beneficial to their health are now greatly increased. There has been uproar about the proposed EU ban, and maybe, against the odds, the consumer is going to come out on top in what is a remarkable modern day case of David and Goliath."

"In a statement released in Luxembourg today at 0830 GMT, the Advocate General concluded that:

The Food Supplements Directive infringes the principle of proportionality because basic principles of Community law, such as the requirements of legal protection, of legal certainty and of sound administration have not properly been taken into account. It is therefore invalid under EU law."

"It should be stressed that the Advocate General�s pronouncement is not a ruling. That will come from the ECJ judges, later - probably around June. But typically, in the vast majority of cases, the Court Judgment follows the recommendations of the Advocate General."

"If the Advocate General�s recommendations are adopted, in effect, the ban on vitamin and mineral forms not included on the EU�s �Positive list,� due to come into effect on 1 August 2005, will be declared illegal. In essence, the positive list of allowable nutrient forms will be deemed to be too narrow, too restrictive, and based on flawed science."

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This is good news on several fronts. It begins to close the door on yet another concerted attempt by the FDA and pharmaceutical companies around the globe attempting to censor naturopathic medicine's success, as people turn to other means of self-care rather than taking drugs without questioning other possibilities. Secondly, it shows there are some issues where Europeans are willing challenge the limits of their socialist systems.

I wonder if Federal regulators who are too conservative (and perhaps uninformed and gutless) are also a threat to healthcare freedom:

A Drug-Free American?
Regulating ourselves into sickness.
By Gilbert Ross

quote:

So Bextra is gone, joining Vioxx on the pharmaceutical museum shelf. Of course, there is a theoretical possibility that one or both of these drugs, and the unique benefits they hold for many, may someday return. Meanwhile, what about the many thousands of patients who got relief of pain and no untoward effects? Too bad � they have been regulated out of the picture. Bextra�s only a "me-too" drug, after all, and one person in a million may get a skin condition, so out it goes. Activists have advocated, regulators have regulated, and patients will now pay the price. The choice to use this drug in appropriate populations � in bygone days, a choice made between doctor and patient � is no longer to be an option. Someday, regulators and consumers will learn that nothing is risk-free.

quote:

With the imminent creation of an independent FDA drug-safety office, it seems likely that whoever is in charge will tend to pull drugs from the market based on ordinary side effects. Will Celebrex � Pfizer�s blockbuster and the only surviving Cox-2 drug in the U.S. � survive for long? Now is the time for patients who depend on it, as well as scientists who would like to see more benefits discovered, to start getting worried.

Here's a link that updates threats to consumer access to herbs, vitamins, minerals, etc . . . regarding current legislation intent on diminishing those freedoms.

The link has easy ways of downloading form letters to your Senators and Representatives, with fax numbers.

http://www.healthfreedomusa.org/index.htm

Good link. Thanks, w.c.

A question I've always had, however, is how do I really know the quality of the herbs I'm buying -- or if they're even really what's advertised? I don't necessarily want the government to step in to guarantee anything, but it seems there should be some kind of oversight on this.

These days, competition is dictated by not only price, but effectiveness, and so most manufacturers use technologies to insure potency, purity, and identification etc. If you go to the manufacturer's website, you should be able to see their listing of these procedures, such as HPLC, and whatever the name of the test is for heavy metals. If you're still unsure, call them and ask.

Some brand names I've used: Jarrow, Solaray, Gaia.

Here's an update on the legal challenge to the EU's attempt to severely constrain consumer freedom re: neutraceuticals, and its potential effects here in the U.S. via the WTO "harmonization" guidelines; it looks as though the Codex commission responsible for the curtailment of neutraceuticals is trying to officially adopt its changes a few days prior to the EU's official response to the jurist's opinion that current Codex policy is seriously flawed; it appears this would limit the extent to which Codex would have to change, especially since the EU will probably not force Codex into a severely compromising position:

http://www.alliance-natural-he...m?action=news&ID=170

WC, I thought this article outlined another threat to health care freedom: leftist fanaticism. Yes, we continue to pay a high price for utopia.

AIDing Disease
The real bogeymen are the ones protesting research and development.
By Deroy Murdock

quote:

Act Up-Paris and the European AIDS Treatment Group even managed to terminate French, German, and Spanish studies of Maraviroc, a prospective AIDS therapy. The group argued that highly immuno-suppressed HIV-positive patients should not try this Pfizer drug as a first treatment.

�At last July�s World AIDS Conference in Bangkok, I saw people splatter red paint on and trash the information booths of several drug companies. They did the same thing two years earlier in Barcelona,� says Abner Mason, executive director of the AIDS Responsibility Project. �This type of activism slows and, in some cases, stops the development of new drugs. This ultimately will mean that millions of people will have nowhere to turn when they need therapy.�

Drug companies are responding to these vandals by retiring their test tubes. Says one pharmaceutical executive: �Activists who hound drug companies, and the incentive system that underpins drug discovery, are directly responsible for depressing R&D for HIV. From a peak of 125 drugs in development in 1998-1999, we are now down to around 80, a 36 percent decline. This is a direct consequence of hostile, unrelenting attacks on the industry. No matter what industry does, no good deed goes unpunished in HIV/AIDS.�

Bad news . . . .


http://www.alliance-natural-he...m?action=news&ID=175

So what exactly does this mean, w.c.?

As near as I can tell, it will eventually mean the United States i.e, Congress, will have to tangle with the World Trade Organization over its language which now severely limits the availability of most higher dosage neutracueticals currently available to the public, as is currently the case in other parts of the world. It remains to be seen if the public outcry over this will be enough to push our elected officials to adopt a different relationship with the WTO, or seriously promote those changes in its "harmonization laws" which now govern global trade agreements. I don't see any amount of public outcry likely to outweigh the trade penalities the U.S. will suffer for not conforming with these new changes in trade laws. And so the most likely scenario would be the U.S., and others with similar concerns like China (interesting bed-fellow) forcing amendments that would loosen the noose. Otherwise, availability will probably be increasingly limited, unless physicians can access a market only available to them, as in Germany where physicians prescribe herbs, or the development of a black market for those willing to take such a risk.

This is the gloomiest description, so perhaps there is some wiggle room left in the trade laws that will eventually favor consumers. I don't get the sense that the battle is entirely over, but that the FDA and its kin around the world, and pharmaceutical companies, have won a victory they've been dreaming of for a long time.

I'll continue to post updates as I receive them.

Phil and others:

What I'm hearing is that Alliance for Natural Health attorneys will seek to change the risk assessment protocols that have yet to be put in place, which will determine maximum allowable dosages. AFNH doesn't seem to believe we will be feeling any of the effects of the Codex ruling in Rome on Monday for some time, and that if dosage levels can be addressed, much will be saved in terms of consumer freedoms.

In the meantime, I'd recommend sending the form letters to your Legislators protesting Codex and asking for a response.

Here's an update, and some good news, with change in both directions possible, it sounds like:

http://www.alliance-natural-he...m?action=news&ID=181

Here's a recent update:

http://www.alliance-natural-he...m?action=news&ID=183

Latest update, with what remains to do in protecting consumer freedom, namely, address the skewed science being applied to neutraceuticals. The maximum dosages of food-based supplements are being scrutinized via what is used currently to determine dosage for pharmaceuticals. This will be the next confrontation.

http://www.alliance-natural-he...m?action=news&ID=184


"Dr Robert Verkerk, executive director of the pan-European Alliance for Natural Health said: �Without positive pressure from our legal challenge, and increasing amounts of cooperation between industry and government authorities, thousands of products containing nutrients which are increasingly difficult to find in our normal diet, but known to be of great importance to our health and wellbeing, could have today been removed from our food supply. We are working hard to bed in our barristers' positive interpretation of the European Court ruling. However, we cannot afford to sit back as future provisions in the Directive set to limit maximum potencies of food supplements could have devastating consequences at least equal to those caused by the originally proposed food supplement ingredients ban."